Identity Increment Jumping

[dvannoy]

I have a primary key set as int, Is Identity = YES, Identity Increment = 1

I have noticed that the increment went from 49 to 1042 Why ?? Running SQL Server 2012

I have googled and found others having this issue. How do you stop this from happening ?

Any help would be appreciated

Thanks

 

[Olaf Doschke]

If you googled, you should also have found the reason behind it.
This happens with restarts. SQL Server rather prevents double values than gaps. It's no bug, it's by design.
Does it matter? Typically the values are used for unique keys and you get unique keys.

If it really matters to you, you can use sequences or trace flag 272.
Shedding more light on this:

http://sqlblog.com/blogs/kalen_delaney/archive/2014/06/17/lost-identity.aspx

Bye, Olaf.

 

[dvannoy]

I have one table that I'm returning the Key field back to the user as the document number. I would like those numbers to stay in a sequence if possible and not jump at random.

 

[Olaf Doschke]

Have you read my answer?

Bye, Olaf.

 

[dvannoy]

Yes I did, thank you. I tried adding the flag 272 to the sql startup but the number still jumped after a restart. I don't need to use the primary key I'm just trying to create some sort of number sequence to give back to the user once the transaction is complete. I just would like those transaction number to stay as close together in sequence as possible.

 

[Olaf Doschke]

Well, saying this happens "at random" after having read the explanations to me points out you didn't read. You normally won't have crashes and if you shutdown you can do gracefully as Kalen Delaney explains.
You did something wrong if this trace flag didn't help. -t272

As you are on SQL2012, you can also switch to using a sequence:

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ff878091(v=sql.110).aspx

Bye, Olaf.

 

[yelworcm]

Do not use an identity column for sequential numbers. Use a SEQUENCE object with the NOCACHE option.